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Anticipatory Trading Against Distressed Mega Hedge Funds

Vikas Agarwal1; George O. Aragon2; Vikram K. Nanda3; Kelsey Wei3

1 Georgia State University · 2 Arizona State University · 3 University of Texas at Dallas

Review of Financial Studies 2025

Stocks expected to be sold by distressed mega hedge funds (MHFs) face anticipatory institutional selling and increased short interest. However, no evidence of anticipatory trading is found in stocks held by nondistressed MHFs, distressed non-MHFs, or stocks confidentially held by distressed MHFs, suggesting that public portfolio disclosure by large and closely followed distressed investors, and not common investment signals, drives anticipatory trading. Distressed MHFs with greater exposure to such anticipatory trading suffer 2.21% lower style-adjusted returns. Stocks subject to anticipatory trading experience negative abnormal returns followed by reversals, indicating the price destabilizing effect of anticipatory trading.

DOI
10.1093/rfs/hhaf082
Volume
38 (12)
Pages
3626-3672
Language
en
Export
BibTeX
Sources
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